Translated material
Museum piece
Irina Antonova simply did not have enough time
This is not about the fact that this amazing woman was very many years old, we are talking about what these years have accommodated. More precisely, it contains thanks to us. If it was not the erudition of Antonova, excitement and accurate (always corresponding to the moment) behavior, many would remain in a state of rattles, where space incomplete with high art is clogged with a domestic noise or political bang.
- Who did you put up there? - Miniature Antonov menacingly pressing against the wall, the Minister of Culture Furtsev asked.
- Tyshler.
- Tyshler?!
And how this conversation would end is unknown if the venerable artist Boris Johanson did not fit.
- What are you fighting, Katyusha? He asked, gaining his shoulders, Ekaterina Alekseevna.
- Here Antonova arranged an exhibition of Tyshler ...
- A good artist.
- Yes? .. And what did they tell me - bad?
The Minister of Culture did not know - okay. He should be so in our forests. But we did not know much, because we did not see. And she showed. The world is great and diverse. It does not end on our border, it continues behind it. And often begins.
I remember the Picasso exhibition, the first, which Ilya Ehrenburg helped to bring to the Union. We only according to the pale reproductions of Czech and Polish people's democratic albums and knew this Pablo. And here in natural form. Right from there. It will open, it will not open - they fortunately to the last. Waiting for the boss. Belated, but opened. Probably because Picasso painted the wonderful dove of the world, and then the struggle against the war was a favorite ideological "chip" of the party.
It seems to be your own.
And then - an avalanche of joy. “Moscow - Paris”, “Moscow - Berlin”, dozens of masterpieces from the largest museums in the world that we saw without leaving the boulevard ring. And every time not a crowd, but a wonderful viewer. Antonova put the Pushkin Museum in a series of our museums recognized by the world along with the Hermitage, Tretyakov Gallery, Russian, and he himself became on a par with outstanding domestic directors: Vasily Alekseevich Pushkarev, Boris Borisovich Piotrovsky. They saved and increased artistic treasures and, most importantly, showed that we are worthy, but still part of the world culture.
It was customary to reckon with Antonova - not because she occupied a certain important place, but because the place that she occupied became important in our life.
A little woman, overcoming the difficulties of her difficult personal fate, moved through the world cultural space with benefit for him and for us. She was a very important (VIP - Truth) person - the head of the international museum community. And its authority is so high that she (well, yes, personally) gave a masterpiece for the exposition in the Pushkin Museum, which few people could get. Vermoer, Manet, Goya ... I am not writing a catalog, I don’t have enough places to list everything, but still the exhibition of Andre Malro, which Irina Alexandrovna came up with and organized at the 95th year of her life, already in the rank of the president of the Pushkin Museum, I remember.
A striking understanding of culture accumulated by a person.
- Do you think this period is over?
- I think, Irina Alexandrovna, the same as you. Nothing well starts.
Here are the "December evenings of Svyatoslav Richter" in the Pushkin Museum.
Once, having hit the festival of the great pianist in France, she invited him to arrange something similar in Moscow. Richter quickly agreed and asked:
- Where can it be?
- With us.
So there was a unique combination of music and painting in the space of the museum. The first heroes were Beethoven and Rembrandt. It was in 1981. For a long time there is no Svyatoslav Teofilovich, now there is no Irina Alexandrovna, but the evenings live. Dozens of outstanding musicians, actors, poets continue the well-started work in the framing of the masters, who also once worked well.
Until the last day, Antonova was absorbed in the idea of restoring the Museum of New Western Art, which was in our country and whose unique collections collected by Sergei Schukin and Ivan Morozov were divided between Moscow and Peter, violating its integrity.
The excitement and arguments of Irina Aleksandrovna did not find support in the state and the museum community, but she did not leave her hopes for a dream. There was simply not enough time - his ninety -eight years.